Tim stood dithering in front of Conner's door, staring at the little cupcake in his hand. This was a bad idea.
Maybe there was a reason no one else was celebrating? Maybe he had missed something? Maybe Conner didn't like birthdays? He had never seemed to truly enjoy the ones M'gann threw him, and maybe the whole idea contained bad memories?
But Conner had looked so down when he had gotten back to the cave, and Tim may not have been part of the team very long, but he didn't think it was right for the day to just pass by, completely unremarked.
Of the group that had become like family since they had liberated Superboy from Cadmus (the anniversary of which had become his official "welcome-to-the-world, isn't-is-great" day, AKA, for anyone that wasn't Kid Flash, his Birthday), M'gann had Lagoon Boy now, Wally was almost never around, the less said about Aqualad the better, and Artemis was…gone. Everyone else was so busy, or grieving.
Or attending Rocket's bridal shower, and why was there time to throw that party but not Connors? The bitterness in that thought surprised him, and he quickly stomped down on the thread of anger that thought engendered.
Nightwing was in the process of driving himself into a nervous breakdown, a grave, or a cowl, with whatever he was working on so secretively.
And Tim. Tim just wanted to make Conner smile in a way he hadn't since he and M'gann had split.
Any decision to knock or go was taken away from him when the door abruptly slid open, Conner staring at him expectantly, one eyebrow raised.
"Can I help you, Robin?"
Tim gaped at him for a second before he forced his jaw to snap shut. Right, super hearing.
"I-" Tim stuttered, ignoring the little voice of his mother in his head tutting for displaying so little composure. "I-"
He gave up on any complicated words and simply thrust out the pathetic cupcake, with the lone candle sticking up in the middle of the red super-shield decorating the white frosting, darting a look at Conner from the corner of his eyes as he looked down at his feet. Conner's gaze switched the the cake, and he actually looked a little surprised.
"Happy Birthday, Conner." Tim got out. Without stuttering thankfully, since he's been practicing those words in his head for about a week.
After an eternal moment of stillness where Tim starts to think this was all a terrible idea, and oh god, he's going to run away right now, Conner's normally hard features soften into a smile Tim had last seen directed and M'gann, and oh god, stupid heart, what are you doing?
Conner reaches out to take the cake from Tim, and Tim's already stuttering heart skips a beat when their fingers brush.
"Thank you, Tim," Conner murmurs, and Tim's heart almost stops for an entirely different reason, oh god he gave himself away somehow, Batman was going to kill him, before he remembers, right, super-hearing. It wasn't really practical to try to keep something from a meta with Superboy's abilities, not when they worked so closely with him, and -
and Superboy had just called him Tim. Called him by the proper name he only really heard from Dick these days, with his parents away, and the amount of time he was spending in costume. Called him Tim in that deep voice that haunted Tim's nights, and Tim's thoughts froze for a split second, but it was enough for his normal mental barriers to fall and his brain-to-mouth filter to go entirely off-line.
"I just, it's your birthday, and I know M'gann would, but she, La'gaan, oh, you probably don't want to talk about that, I just wanted to, well, you looked, and I know I'm just, but, and Nightwing would have, but he's working on something crazy, you can tell by the way he gets that little tic above his right eye, and he's been so restless, maybe not here, but it really shows in Gotham, and, he's been, oh god, I'm babbling, you don't care about that either." Tim managed to wrest control over his tongue soon enough to avoid blabbing his theories about just what exactly Nightwing was working on that involved a late-night meeting at Bludhaven's docks the night Artemis 'died'.
"I, um. Happy Birthday?" Tim repeated again, wilting. God, how did he always come across looking like such a pathetic rookie when faced with Conner? He'd had a whole speech planned out in his head. A simple one, that he could give, hopefully cheer the man up, and then escape. He certainly hadn't meant to bring up Nightwing, or M'gann.
Stupid, stupid, stupid, Tim berated himself as he turned to go.
A warm hand rested against his shoulder, heat radiating through his uniform (that was more than human warmth, and a small voice in Tim's head immediately started spouting theories about Kryptonian energy-absorption and heat-exchange - and an even smaller voice was whispering about how that hand would feel against bare skin, not the kevlar of his top) and stopping his retreat.
"Thank you." Superboy repeated, looking him right in the eyes, and if Tim hadn't known that he didn't have x-ray vision, he would have thought he was using it for sure. That warm, slightly shy smile was still in place and Tim felt a faint blush rise to his cheeks, looking down and scuffing the floor with his foot and feeling like nothing more than a five-year-old with a crush. (He was lucky Nightwing wasn't here to witness this; the man might have recognized his behavior from when he had been a five-year-old with a crush on the amazing acrobat with the loving family and the brilliant smile and incredibly warm arms.)
"Great," Tim said, trying to extract himself from this situation before he completely embarrassed both of them. "I'm glad. Enjoy."
Conner's grip was not painful on his shoulder, but it was firm, and did not loosen even a little when Tim tentatively pulled against it.
"Why don't you come in?"
And now Tim was hallucinating. Wonderful.
But the look in Conner's eyes was the same fragile one he had seen the older (relatively) boy eyeing the calendar with a week ago, when there were no not-so-secret, secret parties being planned. Loneliness and isolation, still not knowing how to reach out, all his friends occupied by more important things than marking the next year for a boy who would never age.
Tim stomped firmly on the part of him that was still reveling in the way Conner's hand on his shoulder was fueling his fantasies, and smiled up and the larger boy. Conner desperately needed some connection, some friendship without the weight of history and past associations and things left unsaid choking the room, but with the comfort of the knowledge that the other knew who he was. That is was safe to discuss all manner of things with them.
Tim was intimately familiar with that feeling from his interactions withold friends who he couldn't discuss being Robin with, and with his new family that was too busy for the angst of a lonely teenager.
Maybe they could be good company for each other.
"I'd love to."